


must it be?

by malcolmreeds



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, missing scene from episode 9 after paul does all those jumps, sickbay angst, teeth brushing bathroom shenanigans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-24
Updated: 2018-01-24
Packaged: 2019-03-09 00:06:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13469502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/malcolmreeds/pseuds/malcolmreeds
Summary: Hugh looked at Paul now and something about the situation told him this wasn’t over, something in the back of his mind screamed at him that his bumbling scientist would have to suffer more before this whole war was through.





	must it be?

_in a world where you are possible_  
_my love_  
 _nothing can go wrong for us, tell me._

Frank O’Hara - [Song](https://genius.com/Frank-ohara-song-annotated) (excerpt)

 

Paul sat on the bathroom counter, his legs swinging slightly in the air beneath him, blue eyes darting and flickering behind pale eyelashes as he spoke at length about his experience with the network. His deft hands articulated in front of him, wild and animated in that way that he did when he was really enthusiastic, when he just _had_ to share his thoughts with another person. That other person was nearly always Hugh and Hugh always listened patiently to whatever his partner had to say, being sure not to interrupt the stream of consciousness that flowed out of him like river water, lest Paul give him that look, the side eye that went something along the lines of ‘you really should know better than to interrupt a genius when he’s speaking’. Or maybe Hugh read into it too much. He was good at that, reading into things too much.

            Like now for instance, he always listened to his partner’s stories and rants and quips but not this time. This time Hugh brushed his teeth and watched Paul and smiled and nodded in all the right places but he wasn’t listening to a word. Couldn’t. His mind was elsewhere. Paul looked good now, happy, in his element, in this place where he belonged at the side of the man he most belonged with but - God, how different the situation had been just some hours previous. Hugh’s mind was still with the Paul in sickbay, crumpled bird-fragile into a bio-bed, forehead slick and hair wet, drifting in and out and in and out of reality, hands cold and clammy and shaking. Body and mind bruised and battered from the harsh reality of all those jumps, abused by the very science he had so admired. Hugh looked at Paul now and something about the situation told him this wasn’t over, something in the back of his mind screamed at him that his bumbling scientist would have to suffer more before this whole war was through. Seeing Paul looking happy and seemingly well was too good to be true, recently the universe had not been so kind to him. But that was Hugh all over, reading into the situation too much, that’s what he tried to think anyway. But no matter how hard he pushed those thoughts away they kept bobbing back up to the surface like an unwelcome waking nightmare, its ghastly arms reaching out to ensnare them both and pull them, suffocating, under the surface.

            ‘Hugh? Hugh you’re not listening to me. It’s interesting, I promise I’m getting to the good bit.’

            Hugh’s face must have betrayed the panicked thoughts circling around his brain because Paul was down from the counter in a shot, one hand steady at the small of Hugh’s back.

            ‘I’ve done something wrong. What is it?’

            ‘Nothing,’ Hugh replied, feigned smile not quite reaching his eyes as much as he hoped, setting his toothbrush back down in its place, ‘It’s fine.’

            Paul shifted now, turning so his back was against the counter, his arms folded across his chest as he faced his partner, an eyebrow raised, ‘And I thought I was supposed to be the terrible liar.’

            ‘Well that was before the whole ‘no side-effects’ thing,’ Hugh didn’t meet Paul’s gaze.

            Paul sighed deeply, eyes rolled up to high heaven, ‘Can we not talk about this right now?’

            ‘We’re talking about this.’

            Hugh’s mind went back with the sickbay Paul, bright lights making his pale skin transparent as Hugh watched the tree like fingers of his blue blue veins pump erratically down his arms, broken up only by the harsh and jarring shape of plastic and metal and wiring under his delicate skin. His breathing quick and shallow, his hands clenching and unclenching by his sides as if grappling with some unseen evil. Teeth clattering together subconsciously, lines and features in his face impossibly marked with exhaustion and pain. Beeping machines all around telling Hugh that Paul was quite likely not far away from a catastrophe that Hugh himself could not fix. Nobody knew how to fix this, the war that was raging inside Paul’s body as a result of being pushed into all that exertion, all those jumps. All they could do was sit and wait for some kind of miracle and, as Hugh had observed, the universe had not been so kind to grant one as of late.

            ‘What do you want me to say?’ bathroom Paul was annoyed, that tell-tale clenching of his jaw and the cold clip to the end of his sentences told Hugh that much, ‘That I’m sorry? I’ve already told you that I’m sorry. I was protecting you, I was thinking about _you_.’

            Paul was right about one thing, he had told Hugh that he was sorry. As the monitors beeped and whirred around them and Hugh took one brief moment out of trying to figure out a fruitless way to save Paul’s God-damned life to squeeze his hand reassuringly for a second. Paul had said he was sorry as beads of sweat gathered at his temples, eyes wide and scared, pained and watering. Sorry was the only word he could get out before agony gripped his body again and he drifted once more out of focus. What Hugh would do to erase that anguished look from his head for good.

            ‘You should have told me,’ Hugh responded, head back in the bathroom again, looking at Paul’s back through the mirror as opposed to looking him in the eyes, ‘I know you thought you were looking out for me, but you should have told me. Or not even me, you could have told any one of the other doctor’s. They could have done something to help. If we had known about the side effects maybe we could have made today … easier on you.’

            Paul clicked his tongue and let out another long sigh, ‘I wasn’t about to go messing up your entire career, your entire life’s work.’

            ‘I don’t care about that,’ Hugh replied, earning a pointed look from Paul, ‘Okay, I do care about that. A lot. I’ve worked hard and I don’t want to see that going to waste but,’ Hugh looked at Paul now, eyes fond, ‘I care about _you._ Work’s work, I could build my reputation back if something happened I suppose. But you’re a living breathing human being.’

            Paul didn’t have a response, which was very unlike him, just kept his arms folded and his eyes level and steady, eyebrows slightly furrowed in a way that told Hugh that he had no idea where Hugh wanted to go with this conversation. Hugh tried his best to sound calm.

            ‘You almost died today Paul. I almost lost you.’

            It was selfish, Hugh could admit that much, but when Paul was coding all he could think about was himself. Who could he feign annoyance at when he opened the tin to find that the last special home baked chocolate biscuit he had been saving had been eaten? Who could he laugh with about silly private jokes and shared half-forgotten memories? Who could he count on to hold him when things got a little bit too much? Like right then, at that moment when the monitors stopped dead.

            ‘You’re being dramatic,’ Paul snorted, absentmindedly picking at his arm where the port rested underneath his Starfleet regulated pyjamas, ‘I’m fine.’

            Hugh didn’t reply right away, that anguished look had risen up in his mind again, Paul’s blue eyes as they were open, staring up at the ceiling but with no life, no spark behind them. The frantic bustle of doctors trying their best to bring him back. Hugh, feeling as if he were marooned on a desert island, feeling so alone so suddenly, like he couldn’t breathe, like a horrid hand clawed away inside of him curling its sticky fingers around his heart and his lungs. Despair, agony.

            ‘You’re fine now thank God,’ Hugh said eventually, ‘But tell me five hours ago that we’d be talking together in the bathroom like always and you’d be okay, I think I’d have laughed,’ Hugh screwed his face up, regretting his choice of words, ‘No I wouldn’t have laughed. But I wouldn’t have believed you. You were _so sick_ , Paul.’

            Something in the way Hugh said those last words must have finally got through Paul’s brilliant, but sometimes altogether dense, mind that this wasn’t really an argument about Paul lying to him. Finally he uncrossed his arms and reached out to rub Hugh’s shoulder comfortingly. Hugh could feel the warmth of his hand through his shirt, a long way removed from their icy touch in sickbay.

            ‘I know you’re always getting into silly accidents with your ridiculous genius experiments but,’ Hugh paused for breath, steadying himself, ‘Nothing like this. Nothing this extreme. I really thought –‘

            Hugh didn’t finish the sentence, he didn’t need to. The fragmented speech hung deafening in the air between them. Hugh looked down from Paul’s face to his neck, the rhythmic pulse he found there the one thing grounding him. Paul was okay now. Right now, in this moment. Paul was alright, he was alive.

            Hugh’s mind went back to sickbay, when Paul had been brought back to the land of the living and his body had calmed down enough to let him rest. He looked impossibly small and vulnerable as he slept, fingers jerking fitfully by his sides, the corners of his mouth twitching as if stuck in some dream. Hugh wondered what he was dreaming about as he stroked his hair soothingly, fingers lacing through layers of white and blonde. He was reading out loud from some medical journal that was lying open on a discarded PADD, Paul had always liked listening to Hugh reading, particularly when he was having an off day, it didn’t really matter what the subject matter was, just listening to his voice and tuning out the rest of the world was something that Paul found great comfort in. And so Hugh read at length about some disease or other, partly for Paul’s sake but also to take his mind away from the harsh reality in front of him, to take his focus away from worrying. If he didn’t read he would break and he couldn’t afford to do that now, what with Paul so sick, so he held himself together the best he could, the best he knew how.

            The shiny veneer Hugh had built up was cracking now of course as bathroom Paul replaced sickbay Paul. Chipping away and exposing all those vulnerabilities that quivered underneath, exposing them to the light.

            ‘I’m just -’ words were failing Hugh now as he tried to swallow down the tears that threatened to overcome him, ‘I’m just glad you’re okay.’

            Hugh rarely ever cried, Paul was the weepy one if you could believe it, Hugh was always that strong and reliable pillar. Admittedly it altogether frightened Paul that Hugh had become emotional, but he pulled him close into an embrace which he hoped would make him feel at least a little bit better. Hugh wanted to hold Paul as tightly as he possibly could, but remembering how feeble he had looked just those few hours ago made him tentative, gingerly putting his arms around him as if he was a ticking time bomb, as if he would break at any moment, smashed to smithereens.

            When Paul had eventually woken up in sickbay, looking miles better than he had not long earlier, Hugh was all smiles and encouragement, telling him how proud he was of him and how he had saved everyone. Paul didn’t make much sense at first, rambling on and on about some forest and repeating over and over again how Hugh was _always_ looking out for him. It was hard to think that that was today – God – it felt impossibly long ago. Once Paul regained some clarity, and recognition of his surroundings set in, that’s when Hugh let himself breathe, let Paul know that he was loved and cared for, not just by him but by Tilly, Burnham, hell, even Saru. Paul scoffed telling Hugh not to make such a fuss about him as he fumbled with the zippers on his uniform with fingers that tremored slightly still, that anybody would have done what he did in his position. Hugh wanted to tell him that no, they wouldn’t have. That Paul was so brave and so selfless, too selfless for his own good, that sometimes it was okay to look out for himself. But Paul’s eyes still betrayed some hints of the exhaustion, the ordeal that he’d gone through that day, so Hugh kept quiet and Paul was well enough to be discharged.

            Now, of course, in the bathroom, the cup had spilled over and Hugh let himself be held. The reality of the day hit Paul now and he realised that while he may not fully understand why, people cared when he got himself into a mess, Hugh had been sick with worry and he couldn’t have that.

            ‘Sorry for being a bit of an ass,’ Paul said as he pulled away from the hug eventually.

            ‘A bit?’ Hugh replied incredulously, wiping away stray unruly tears from his cheek with the back of his hand, the smile on his face told Paul that he wasn’t really mad.

            ‘Sorry for lying, sorry for nearly getting myself killed,’ Paul said and Hugh waved a hand around in the air in between them, as if trying to dismiss it, ‘No I’m serious. The mycelial network is fascinating and wonderful and like nothing I’ve ever experienced before in my life but … it’s just not worth it. It doesn’t come close to this, us, what we’ve got,’ he gestured wildly around him, at the walls and the mirror and the sink, ‘Even just being in this bathroom together, existing. That’s real. That’s what I want most.’

            Paul clasped Hugh by his upper arms, thumbs rubbing reassuring circles against the fabric, ‘No more jumps. The Discovery will have to figure out how to go on without me, it’s not worth jeopardising our relationship for. I need to go and get my head examined, get away for a while, you know?’

            Hugh nodded, he reached up to brush back the hair at the side of Paul’s head, Paul leaning in to the palm of his hand, ‘No more jumps.’

            It was another lie of course, one that Hugh let himself believe. It would be exposed in less than a day, and their new found bliss would last even shorter than that. Still, there’s no harm in letting two dreamers dream, in letting them live in hope and happy ignorance for just one more night.

**Author's Note:**

> I felt like although I enjoyed episode 9, there was this huge glaring gap between Paul doing the 133 jumps and getting battered to hell, and the next time we see him looking right as rain telling Lorca that he'll do one more jump. This story is my attempt at bridging that gap, with a focus on Hugh's thoughts about the whole event mainly. Thank you for reading!


End file.
